50 Ways to Love Your Leaver

Geoff's secretary ushered me into the office and Geoff was behind his desk, looking sombre. I sat down and waited for him to speak.

"It's not good news, I'm afraid, but it is news you need to have. It's true, your wife is cheating on you. But the chap she is having the affair with is old enough to be her father. Her grandfather, even."

I was bewildered. "What? But who? Not her stepdad, Tony?"

Geof shook his head. "No, we were able to get the name of her lover, he's an American man, as I say, and much older than her, his name is William Gentry."

I let out an involuntary gasp of horror. "Shit! William fucking Gentry?"

"You know him?" Geoff sounded tense.

"Yes. Or rather, I know of him. He is her birth father. The bastard sexually assaulted Louise when she was 19, when she was having her 19th birthday party, in fact. Louise's mother found them together.

From what I've been told he admitted he had forced himself on her and in order to save Louise the ordeal of going to court, it was arranged that Gentry would slither off back to the States, where he was from, never to return to Britain, again. Obviously the bastard changed his mind and came back."

Geoff shook his head. "If they are having a consensual relationship, which they are, then I doubt very much that the sexual assault story could be true. Which, in fact, is borne out by the recorded conversations we obtained.

"What they are doing is very illegal and incest cases are dealt with very seriously in our courts. Both participants, willing ones, that is, are usually given jail sentences. I still have some pull with the local police, do you want me to report them to the police?"

I nodded in agreement. Fuck. This was terrible. Louise's poor mother, Jane. And her stepdad, Tony. What impact would this have on them? And to learn that all those years ago he didn't sexually assault Louise, they were having a consensual affair even back then? Oh God! I'd have to tell Jane!

I cleared my throat, before I could speak, again. "I'm going to have to tell Jane, Louise's mother and her stepdad. Then I'm going to divorce the duplicitous bitch!"

He stood up, shook me by the hand and said: "No silly stuff, OK? Keep it legal, I know you might be tempted to get physical revenge on them, but don't do anything you'll regret, OK?"

I promised him that I wouldn't and I left his office.

I called Carol and asked if I could meet her at her nice little Mews cottage in the centre of town. Luckily she works from an office within her home. And so it was, a quarter hour afterwards I was sat in Carol's living room, telling her the whole sordid shitstorm of a story. Crying as I did so.

Carol was fulminating. "The rotten, conniving little bitch! When I think of the times when after you'd introduced me to her, she spoke to me about her father who had assaulted her. Damn! Now it all makes sense. I thought at the time that the stories she told about him were too off pat. I concluded it was because, as an assault victim, she was using the technique of dissociation to remove herself psychologically from the trauma. But instead, it turns out she was lying like a hairy egg! The bitch!

"Shit. Is it possible that I believed her because I wanted to believe her? Because I couldn't see any reason why a woman would lie about something like that? 'Believe every woman' my fucking arse!"

She looked at me: "Anyway, that's not important at the moment. What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to divorce the bitch and the matter of their continuing incest has now been taken out of my hands, it's being referred to the police."

"Fucking good job," said Carol. "Fucking perverted bastards!"

Even though she was a psychologist, Carol had some fairly firm and not very liberal perspectives on life.

I looked at her, before speaking. "I'm going to have to go and see Jane and Tony, let them know what's happening, what's been happening. God! What a mess!"

Carol looked at me and said: "I'll come with you. I don't want you to face that ordeal alone. You need support and I'm the one who'll be able and happy to give it to you. After all, the amount of support you've given me over the years, it's only right to return the favour."

We went to the nice little semi that Jane lived in with her husband Tony. I'll never forget the scream of pure horror that came from Jane's mouth, she began sobbing, clutching at Tony who looked almost as shell shocked and as devastated as Jane. We comforted the two of them as best we could.

As we got in Carol's car she said: "As you know my little brother is a solicitor, he'll be able to handle the divorce for you. In fact, I'll get him to draw up the paperwork really quickly. I'll get him to file them with the court. What a fucking mess she has made of it all, damn her! And if you want, you can come stay in my spare room."

I accepted Carol's offers of help with considerable thanks.

I would not have thought it possible but Geoff Lithgoe's pull with the local police must have been considerable as both Louise and William Gentry were arrested later that same day. They were charged with incest. He managed to get a semi-illicit copy of the bodycam footage of Louise's arrest.

"Louise Collins? "Yes? What is it, officer?"

"I am Detective Constable Paul Richards of the Sex and Serious Crimes Unit of the Midshires Police Constabulary. This is my colleague PC Sandra Jones. I am arresting you on suspicion of having committed incest with William Gentry, your father. You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence."

Louise had collapsed against the door, shaking, a look of utter bewilderment on her face.

Geoff had phoned me and told me what had happened, emailing me the video file only 45 minutes after the arrest. Apparently the arrest of William Gentry did not pass off without incident as he had decided to play the sillybollocks with the police and he was arrested for incest, assault on a police officer and resisting arrest.

Louise was fairly quickly bailed out, but William Gentry spent some time in police custody, the idiot.

I took the opportunity of Louise's absence from the house to collect some clothing and stuff and to take it to Carol's place.

The next several weeks were a bit of a blur, to be honest. I suppose I was in shock. Well, what young, fit and virile man in his early 30s wants to find out that his wife was having an affair with her own father who was close to 70 years of age?

I got Paul, Carol's younger brother, to handle the divorce and the Crown Prosecution Service took on the incest case and the judge really went to town on them in his sentencing statement after the jury found them guilty.

"Your barrister argued that your crime was a victimless crime. I have to say that this simply will not wash with me. You both cheated on your spouses, you Mr Gentry some years ago, you Mrs Collins recently. You both caused them irreparable hurt with your so-called victimless crimes.

"Incest is a crime with broader implications, too. It strikes at the very moral fabric and fibre of our society. Incest is a crime that must be rooted out and punished when it is discovered. And it must be punished with the appropriate levels of severity.

"It gives me no pleasure, but you must be punished for what you have done. I therefore sentence you both to serve two years in prison. And I strongly recommend that Mr Gentry be deported once his sentence is completed."

The trial had been brought forward as cases in Crown courts can take several years to come to trial, but their case took only six months.

I'd filed for divorce on the grounds of adultery with her own father which did cause a bit of a stir in the tabloid press who took the story up.

I'd thought that maybe Louise would have objected, or put up a bit of a fuss, but she didn't bother. Also, she never tried to apologise to me, or even speak to me after her arrest.

So it was a case of "just slip out the back, Jack, Make a new plan, Stan" with me just forgotten about and pushed to one side.

She'd made some half arsed apology to her mother. Apparently She and William had been in secret communication over the years and his latest relationship back in the USA had broken down (his common law wife had found the letters between him and Louise) so he'd decided to come back to the UK and restart their illegal relationship.

They had some vague idea that she'd file for divorce with me on the grounds of unreasonable behaviour, but she hadn't worked out how to engineer the situation so she could make out I was behaving unreasonably, and then I discovered her cheating and filed for a divorce on the grounds of adultery with her own father, which blew their plans to bits.

The divorce was a foregone conclusion, really, given the fact that when the divorce hearing came up she was already in jail for incest and, therefore, the adultery with her own father.

I'd had to give evidence during the incest trial and much to my surprise their defence barrister who bore the unlikely name of Mr Jolly (they shared the one barrister) had asked me what it had been like for me to be a cuckold to my wife and her father?

Before I'd been able to formulate an answer (that wouldn't have had me thrown out of the court) the judge pounded his gavel three times. The look on his face was one of utter fury. "Members of the jury, please disregard that disgraceful question from Mr Jolly, Barrister for the defence. And Mr Jolly I find you to be in contempt of court and I fine you £500."

Mr Jolly had blushed, stammered out an apology and the instructing solicitor had firmly poked him in the back and remonstrated with him, quietly, but furiously.

After the divorce the house was sold, and we split the assets 50/50. There was no alimony, but it seemed that the Teaching Regulation Agency were not keen on allowing someone with a conviction for incest, and the subsequent jail term, to be allowed to work as a teacher once she left prison. Oh, that was a pity, wasn't it? Apparently it's wrong to gloat. Tough.

I bought a nice two bedroom house round the corner from Carol's place and Carol arranged for me to get counselling from someone she knew. Carol's friend was also working with Jane and Tony, counselling them, too.

As for me? The counselling was helping me to get through the pain and heartbreak. The bastard's remark about me being their cuckold had hurt me more deeply than I'd realised, but I was helped to understand that it was, in reality, an adulterous relationship that had killed our marriage.

And I was young enough to start dating again, given enough time. And the world was my oyster. Apparently.

As for Louise, she actually only served just over a year of her sentence, probably due to the fact that they were closing HMP Holloway in 2016 and wanted to thin the population down before sending the prisoners to the remaining female prisons.

William Gentry was in Pentonville Prison in London and he was deported back to the USA after he had served 18 months. Much to his chagrin Louise didn't follow him back to the States.

Actually, I think the incest conviction put paid to that part of their plan, as foreigners with criminal convictions aren't, generally, welcomed into the USA.

Geoff insisted on me looking at the transcripts of the bugging and that actually made me feel better to an extent. She and William spent a good deal of time talking and Louise told him that she felt bad about what she was doing to me, that I "didn't deserve" it, as I was a good man, but that she couldn't allow that to stand in the way of her one true love with William. Strangely enough, neither of them seemed to give any thought to Jane, Louise's' mum, which actually upset me. After all, Jane had given birth to her and raised her and it was as if she no longer existed in Louise's weird little world.

Could I have got more of a revenge on them? Well, yes, I suppose that I could have. But that would have brought me down to their level, plus it would have risked me getting jail time myself. Because I know that if I'd have allowed my imagination to run riot things would not have ended well for them or for me.

So, I'd have to be content with jail sentences for incest, a divorce for adultery, a deportation and the fact that it would be impossible for Louse to get a teaching job ever again. Oh, what a shame! Too bad!

Must finish, now. I'm going to have a shower and a shave (dreaded 5 o'clock shadow) before I go out on a date with a young lady whom I met whilst we were both trying to decide what fresh vegetables to buy in our local Lidl store. Funny how things happen. It looks like there are also 50 ways to meet a lover.